Hell and Back
by Raven Sinead
Summary: The Collectors swarmed. Humans fell. The Alliance failed. Ashley Williams has never handled defeat well, but Horizon spells more than defeat. It's a reunion she never wanted to have, a face she thought dead to her. The face of a soldier, a killer...and an attraction unexplored. An exploration of what might have happened. One-shot. FemShepxAshley. Story Complete.


**Horizon**

The mirror cracked. Ashley stared at it, the fractured image of her face an apt metaphor for the splintered thoughts screaming through her head. She flexed her right hand, staring at the armor plating, not even scratched from its impact with the small mirror.

Ashley had stayed in her armor after…after what had happened, too shaken to remove it. Her entire body felt tense, ready for a battle, even though the Collectors had already come and gone…even after she had failed the colonists on Horizon.

_There was nothing I could do_, the soldier attempted to rationalize. _Nothing. We were outmatched, outgunned, and even __**Shepard**__ couldn't pull a miracle out of her ass this time. _

The armored fist thudded into the mirror again and tiny pieces of reflective glass clattered into the sink and rattled against the porcelain. Shepard. The very name ignited Ashley's soul, like a molten brand pressed against skin, searing it, making it itch where she couldn't reach. It had been hours, hours since the few minutes that had turned Ashley's world on its end. Hours since Horizon had been a terror soaked nightmare as the Collectors came and raped the colony. Hours since the orders had come down; an Alliance transport ship would be there tomorrow and the remaining marines would muster out for a new destination.

Ashley sighed and stared at the minute flecks of glass in the sink. She pulled off her gloves and began the arduous task of removing her armor. The attacks were over, the Collectors gone, and Shepard somewhere in orbit in the new Normandy. The armor fell to the floor in its various pieces, Ashley's hands trembling as they pulled at the stuck zipper of her under-armor.

As much as she wanted to, she could not erase the image of her former commander from her mind. She could not shake the sensations that had washed over her when she heard that voice in her ears for the first time in two years…two long years of fruitless self-convincing, regrets, guilt…longing.

_Why couldn't I have said something with __**meaning**_! The gunnery chief berated herself. _**Why**__ did I simply just stand there and react!?_

She did not have to question herself for very long. The answer was simple. Raegan Shepard could be the most _infuriating_ woman in the galaxy. From gentleness to callousness to kindness to downright brutality. The woman was all four seasons in the span of an hour, bewildering, confusing, demanding in the mere force of presence she exuded. And Ashley had loved her.

_As a subordinate cares for her commanding officer_, the marine attempted to convince herself. For the thousandth time. The millionth time. The time that was never the charm, no matter how many multiples of three it might include.

The memory of their interaction played through Ashley's mind again and she kicked her armor across the concrete floor of her Spartan quarters, wrecking the careful order that she prided herself on keeping, no matter the circumstances.

_Always be ready for inspection_, her father had told her the day before she shipped out to basic_, even when you're comfortable in your career. You're a Williams. All we've got is our pride. No matter your CO, no matter the postings you get, you __**keep**__ that pride, kiddo. _

Pride. Loyalty. Bearing. All things that the Williams family cherished, even those who hadn't joined up. It had been her pride that kept her from falling for the light in Shepard's eyes…before the woman had changed. Before Raegan had died and been rebuilt by the worst example humanity had to offer.

_Damn it to hell_. Ashley leaned against the wall tapped the back of her head against it as she remembered the heat of Raegan's gaze on her again. Somehow Cerberus had rebuilt her eyes. Somehow, they were still that impossible shade of brilliant green, light and menacing, like the sky on earth warning of an imminent tornado.

* * *

_Ashley ducks behind a crate, listening to the screeching of her shield generator's warning, watching the Collector's ship deflect anti-aircraft fire and take off from Horizon. She hears the sound of running and readies her weapon until Delan's voice rings out. _

_ "No, don't let them get away!" he cries. _

_ Ashley's shoulders slump and her grip on her rifle falters. Another failure for the Alliance. Another colony raided and brutalized. Another survival that shouldn't have been. She begins to move, to console Delan, when the sound of another voice freezes her in place. _

_ "There's nothing we can do." the voice is low and rough, tinged with a steely sorrow that can only belong to __**one**__ woman. A consummate soldier, the most frightening of strangers, the strongest of souls. "They're gone."_

_ Ashley's heart begins pounding in her chest, louder and harsher than the shield generator that still screams at her in warning. _

_ "Half the colony's in there!" Delan shouts. "They took Egan and Sam and…and Lilith! Do something!"_

_ Each name flies through the air like a bullet, like a knife in the gut pushed deeper and deeper and deeper. Ashley tries to hold on, tries to keep her composure and maintain her bearing, but hearing their names, hearing the desperation in Delan's voice serves only to twist the knife. _

_**He's just a simple man, a simple mechanic. Horizon was his world and now it's…now it's gone. **_

_ "I didn't want it to end this way." Ashley leans back against the crate, shuddering as the familiar voice answers the mechanic's plea. It is determination and valor, but acceptance of losses. It is Raegan Shepard…the woman who gave her life for the galaxy. The woman who should be dead. "I did what I could."_

_**No you didn't! **__Ashley's thoughts accuse. __**You died! You abandoned the galaxy! You abandoned **__**me.**_

_ "More than most, Shepard." Ashley recognizes Garrus' voice and the words he speaks make her cringe. _

_ Always the accolades for Raegan Shepard, always the encouragements from all races and species. Yes, Raegan did admirable things, but the woman was not infallible! She made mistakes, and this…this life serving Cerberus was one of them. _

_**I would hope, if faced with resurrection by such a reprehensible group, that I would have the courage to end my existence! **__Ashley thinks, feeling her pulse pound with anger. _

_ "Shepard?" Delan asks. "I know that name…I remember you. You're some type of big Alliance hero."_

_ Unable to stand hearing anything further, Ashley holsters her weapon and strides out from behind the crate. "Commander Shepard." her voice is laced with justifiable contempt. "Captain of the Normandy. The first human SPECTRE. The Savior of the Citadel. You're in the presence of a god, Delan." she glances at the mechanic, and then back to Shepard, refusing to meet that stormy green gaze. "Back from the dead."_

_ Delan glares at her, crossing his arms with spite. "All the good people we lost, and a Williams gets left behind. Figures."_

_ Ashley's shoulders bunch into shrieking knots as she looks at Shepard, remembering the screaming, the outright fury as she demanded to know __**why**__ her life had been spared on Virmire. Raegan had not given her an answer, just a look. A look that conveyed more emotion than Ashley cared to contemplate. Enough emotion to make her believe that Shepard wanted to be more than her commander. Her pride had faltered, but not broken. _

_ "Screw this." Delan threw his hands up in the air. "I'm done with you Alliance types."_

_ He walks away, leaving Ashley's throat swollen and raw as she at last meets Raegan's eyes. Garrus nods to her in greeting, but the dark haired woman in the strange white skin-tight suit says nothing. Raegan holds the silence, controlling it. In rebellion, in anger, Ashley breaks it. _

_ "I thought you were dead, commander." she cringes as the rank Shepard no longer holds crosses her lips. "We all did."_

_ Shepard smiles, and Ashley looks for the creasing of the scars that are no longer there…lost memories of the hardship that Raegan had endured. _

_ "It's been too long, Ash." the nickname sounds wrong to the gunnery chief's ears and she bristles. _

_**How **__**dare**__** you be so calm! How **__**dare**__** you speak to me as though we've only been away from each other for a month!**_

_ "How have you been?" Raegan asks, her eyes searching Ashley's own, that infuriating light in them that Ashley still admires and finds herself drawn to. _

_ "That's it!?" Ashley demands, her voice cold and hollow sounding to her ears. She remembers her bearing, her pride, all that she has left, and evens her tone, attempting to sound as nonchalant as her former CO. "You show up after two years and act like nothing's happened? I would've followed you anywhere, commander. I thought you were gone. I…" Ashley stops, looking at the woman before her, calm in the face of her accusations, unhurt by the recriminations Ashley attempted to hurl. "…you were more than our commander." Ashley whispers, knowing that a soldier can take a beating, the accusatory screams. It is the whisper that breaks a warrior. "Why didn't you try to contact me?" she asks, hoping the bladed question will pierce Raegan's heart, as her very existence is draining Ashley's blood. "Why didn't you let me know you were alive?"_

_**Did I mean nothing? Was the light in your eyes a lie? Do you know how much I **__**hate**__** you right now?**_

_ "I was out for two years." Raegan explains, her voice too low to be callous, her words too quick to be remorseful. "You've moved on with your career and your life. Why reopen old wounds?"_

_**Is that what I was, Shepard? A wound? Then **__**where**__** is the scar!? Where, on your new, **__**flawless**__** body is the mark that reads "Ashley Williams touched this heart"? It's nowhere. You're a fucking liar, Raegan. I should **__**never**__** have believed you.**_

_ "I moved on." Ashley states, emphatic, daring to meet Raegan's gaze…falling forward again into that viridian gleam, softening against her will, and letting anger tinge her words. "But here you are, pulling me back in. And now we've got reports about you and Cerberus."_

_**Answer! Answer for the crimes you have **__**undoubtedly**__** committed!**_

_ "Reports?" Garrus asks. "You mean you already knew?"_

_ Ashley draws herself up. "Alliance said Cerberus could be behind our missing colonies. We got a tip that this one could be the next to get hit. I went to Anderson but he wouldn't talk. But there were rumors you weren't dead, Raegan." she smiles in satisfaction as Shepard flinches at the use of her first name. "Worse; that you were working for the enemy."_

_ "Our colonies are disappearing." Shepard says. "The Alliance turned its back on them."_

_**That's not true! **__Ashley's pride shrieks. __**I'm here! The Alliance was **__**here**__**! Are we nothing? Am I nothing!**_

_ "Cerberus is the only group willing to do something about it." Shepard rationalizes. _

_**How fucking dare you!?**_

_"Bullshit." Ashley calls Shepard on her lies; she seems to still be the only one who ever will. "I know what Cerberus is like. They talk about putting humans first, but at what cost?"_

_**You hated them too, Raegan. Or don't you remember? What did they do to you? Put some chip in your head? Slice off the part of your brain that hated them? **_

_ Ashley shakes her head in disgust. "I wanted to believe that you were alive…I just never expected anything like __**this**__. You've turned your back on everything we stood for!"_

_ "Ash, you know me." Shepard speaks, low and almost imploring. "You know I'd only do this for the right reason."_

_**The woman you were would. **__Ashley things, remembering the awe she felt on Eden Prime as Shepard fought through the geth and shoved Kaidan Alenko out of the way of the Prothean beacon. The awe that had turned into affection, then to adoration, and then to…__**no. It wasn't that. It **__**can't**__** be that. **_

_ "You saw it yourself." Shepard's voice heats, carrying the fire that once stirred Ashley's blood and made her heart race. "The Collectors are targeting human colonies. And they're working with the Reapers!"_

_ "I'd like to believe you, Shepard." Ashley replies, wishing that it weren't true. "But I don't trust Cerberus, and it worries me that you do. What the hell did they do to you? What if they're behind this? What if they're the ones working with the Collectors?"_

_ "Typical Alliance attitude." the dark haired woman scoffs, her accent an irritating whine. "You're so focused on Cerberus that you're blind to the real threat."_

_**You bitch! **__Ashley forms an immediate dislike for this woman, and the pinch of Shepard's brow seems to indicate that she feels the same. The reaction throws Ashley off guard._

_ "You're letting how you feel about their history get in the way of the facts." Shepard says. _

_ Ashley tenses again, recognizing Raegan's infuriating diplomacy. The woman could justify her actions like no other. After all, nothing else could explain the "Butcher of Torfan" retaining a command after the atrocities. _

_ "Or maybe you feel like you owe Cerberus because they saved you." Ashley accuses, unwilling to fall for Raegan's powers of persuasion. "Maybe it's you."_

_ "Ash…"_

_ "It doesn't matter." the chief bites. "__**I**__ still know where my loyalties lie. I'm an Alliance soldier. It's in my blood."_

_**The blood that you heat, Raegan. It's still mine and by **__**God**__** I will not let you win me over. You came close, but I didn't fall then, and I **__**will not**__** fall now!**_

_ "I'm reporting back to the Citadel." Ashley forces herself to continue, even though her blood roars in her ears at the frustration crossing Shepard's face. "I'll let them decide if they believe your story."_

_ Ashley summons her strength and turns away, feeling Raegan's eyes on her like twin suns, hotter than hell and twice as damning. _

_ "I could use someone like you in my crew, Ash." Raegan says, a hint of weakness in the steel that is her voice. "It'll be just like old times."_

_ "No." Ashley looks back at the commander, almost hoping it is for the last time. "It won't. I'm no fan of aliens, but Cerberus has a history of being extremist. I'll never work for a group like that. Good-bye, Shepard. And, for what it's worth, good luck."_

_ She continues to walk away, back to her barracks. In the distance, she hears Shepard's voice. _

_ "Joker, send the shuttle to pick us up. I've had enough of this colony."_

_**It's had enough of you, Shepard.**__ Ashley's thoughts hiss. __**The whole damn galaxy has had enough of you. Maybe you should have stayed dead.**_

* * *

Ashley stared out the tiny window, watching smoke rise from the buildings that had caught fire during the assault. Fire that had yet to die.

_Stop_, she ordered herself. _I said my piece. I made my peace. Shepard can go and get herself killed again for all I care. _

Ashley turned as the door of her quarters flew open. Her jaw went slack as it crashed into the opposite wall. The gunnery chief clenched her fists. Trust Shepard to make an entrance, an unwanted, unsolicited, bombastic entrance.

Ashley waited for the silence to change, to deepen or be broken with harsh words from her former commanding officer. Her knuckles turned white with the strain of clenching her fists. Shepard simply stood there, leaning casually against the doorway, dressed in nothing but a simple black t-shirt and the cargo pants she had always been too fond of.

"Take this kiss upon the brow," Raegan spoke, clear and authoritative, "and, in parting from you now, thus much let me avow—you are not wrong, who deem that my days have been a dream; yet if hope has flown away, in a night, or in a day, in a vision, or in none, is it therefore the less _gone? All_ that we see or seem is but a dream within a dream."

"You know I never liked Poe." Ashley frowned at Shepard's quote.

"I know." Raegan smirked. "I spent time memorizing that just for you."

Ashley reined in her temper as she had so many times aboard the first incarnation of the Normandy. She held her tongue in the presence of her commanding officer…before realizing that the woman before her no longer held any rank or sway. That the tenuous authority Raegan once possessed was ended, ended when she came back from the dead and put on a Cerberus uniform.

"You're a fucking bitch, Raegan." Ashley snapped. "I heard you call for transport. What the hell are you doing back here?"

"I hate leaving things unfinished." Shepard shrugged her shoulders and closed the door behind them.

"If that's the case, why'd you join up with Cerberus?" Ashley stepped back as Shepard drew closer. "Why not come back to the Alliance and finish things properly?"

"Death changes a person." Shepard grinned, her razor smile that could slice through enemies and friends alike.

"You're doing this on purpose aren't you?" Ashley asked, beginning to shake as fury overwhelmed her. "Trying to get a rise out of me, just like you did on Ilos."

"C'mon, Ash. You know the definition of insanity as well as I do." Shepard leaned against the wall. "Why would I try what didn't work on Ilos?"

"Whatever you try sure as hell won't work now." Ashley muttered. "You wanted my pride and my honor, Shepard. Everything you wanted that night was against regulations."

"We all knew we were going to die." Raegan replied, a flash of vulnerability cracking the shield she always wore. Only for a moment, a brief moment, but enough to give Ashley reason to believe that the woman she had fought alongside, laughed with, drank with, mourned with, still existed. "You know me, Ash. I've never been good at letting what I want go."

Anger crackled across Ashley's nerves, burning deep into her. "_That's_ why you're here, isn't it?" she hissed. "To get what you fucking want. Get the fuck out, Shepard. It wasn't an option then, and it sure as hell isn't now."

"You see any rank on these shoulders?" Shepard asked, pushing and twisting the knife named Ilos in Ashley's gut, two years after it had been removed.

"That's what stopped me then, Raegan. It's not what's stopping me now." Ashley stood unmoved. The flash of anger and pain in Raegan's eyes didn't matter.

It was what they had wanted from each other. Neither could break the other. Ashley's defenses withstood Raegan's assault, every time, and the former commander had needed that; needed to know that someone possessed the ability to defy her, to question her, to challenge her. Their relationship had been nothing like Shepard and Kaidan's, a give and take of information and emotion, a shared friendship. No. She and Raegan battered at each other's walls, questioning everything, wrecking each other's composure, sometimes just for the thrill of the fight.

"What _is_ stopping you now?" Shepard asked, stepping closer, close enough that Ashley could smell the vanilla and cinnamon soap that Raegan had been so fond of.

_Aboard the Normandy SR1. When we were friends. When we wanted to be more…if her choice in that hasn't changed…has what she wanted from me changed? _

"The fact that you're working for an organization that I despise." Ashley retorted, hoping the vitriol in her voice would make Shepard and that intoxicating smell take a step backward.

A step forward instead.

"Don't be that way, Ashley." Raegan said, her voice dropping into a lower register, heating with intensity. "So you hate the uniform. So do I. Way too damn scratchy."

"I hate the goddamn uniform and the fact that a different woman is wearing it." Ashley snapped. "You're not the Raegan Shepard I know."

"You never took the time to get to know me properly." Raegan smirked, hinting at the night-that-wasn't before Ilos. "So don't be all high and mighty and thinking I've changed. I can still put you in your place…chief."

"You're _not_ my commander anymore." Ashley seethed, hating herself as she gave ground and backed up a step, cursing internally as she felt the cool of the wall blocking any further movement. "You're _nothing_ to me, Shepard."

"Hmmm." the once-commander mused as she stood there, shadowing Ashley's slight movements with her own. "A rose by any other name would surely smell as sweet." she quoted Shakespeare. "But if a rose had a different body…"

"Fuck off, Raegan." Ashley pushed away from the wall and walked past Shepard, fully intending to leave the room and walk outside, where the scent of vanilla and cinnamon was not so cloying, and the sun would dim the glow in those damnable green eyes.

"No." Shepard almost growled and her hand latched around Ashley's arm, arresting the marine's movement.

Her grip was firm, surety itself, and before Ashley could think to counter, Shepard had taken her arm and twisted it behind Ashley's back, pulling painfully at the shoulder. The former commander's other arm laced around Ashley's neck as she molded their bodies together, hard muscle and scarred skin, battle-damaged beauty.

"Remember this?" Shepard asked, her voice a low and dangerous whisper, stirring the small, dark hairs on Ashley's neck and making them rise. "Remember what it felt like, just to feel?"

Ashley's training kicked and she planted her feet and flexed her knees, ramming the back of her head against Shepard's nose. The arms around her faltered and Ashley tore free, glaring at the woman who had put her heart through hell.

"I don't want to remember." she growled. "I don't want to think of it, because the hands that touched me that night aren't the same damn hands! The fact that you're even alive is disgusting! It's against _everything_ you fought for! It's against God!"

"I wanted one life, one death, and hopefully one love in between that." Shepard retained her composure and regained her feet. "But I only got the first two. Maybe I came back for the third."

_Love?_ Ashley stared at Raegan as her hands began to tremble with something that…something that couldn't be anger, that couldn't be fear, but still existed as both and neither.

"Find it somewhere else." she kept her resolve. "There's nothing for you here."

"Goddamn, Ash." Shepard muttered, her fingers running lightly over the bridge of her nose where Ashley had struck her. "This is cold, even for you. I pretty much just told you that I came back from the dead for you…"

"You were built out of spare parts to be a mouthpiece for Cerberus. Because Cerberus doesn't _have_ heroes. And now, neither does humanity. Get out, Raegan. You shouldn't have come back."

Ashley tried not to see the pain welling in Shepard's green eyes. She attempted to believe that the woman in front of her had nothing that remained of the woman she had…_loved?_ _Did I? Did she? What **is** this?_

"I didn't really have a choice in the matter, Ash." Shepard shrugged, stepping closer, with none of the former insouciance and bravado she had when she entered the room. "I didn't ask for any of this. Let the goddamn galaxy sort itself out for once. Let me die in peace. But no. I get dragged back from the other side of fucking eternity and then I see the one person I thought I shared something deeper with and you treat me like a monster."

"You always have a choice, Raegan." Ashley muttered. "You can't lie to yourself about who you are or what you've done. I made the right choice on Ilos…"

"Where's your conviction, chief?" Shepard grinned, stepping closer again, the scent of her washing over Ashley once again. "I'll go." Raegan whispered, her breath ghosting across Ashley's cheek. "I will just…please, Ash. Remind me…remind me that there are good things in life. One kiss good-bye. For all the things we could have had and didn't." Raegan leaned forward, pressing her forehead to Ashley's, tangling her fingers in the gunnery chief's black hair, free from its confines. "Please. Just a kiss."

Ashley's hands trembled at Shepard's nearness. The woman commanded the same presence she always had, the ability to shift the mood of a room with a word, a glance, a gesture. Raegan had a charisma, a fire and magnetism that drew people towards her. But Ashley knew, if they got to close, they would be incinerated. She refused to let that happen.

"One kiss." she relented, thinking it best to cave this once, to give in to this singular demand and let whatever might have been, and whatever still was, vanish into the dark places of the galaxy along with the ghost of Raegan Shepard.

"Thank you." Shepard breathed.

Ashley's own breath shuddered out as Shepard's hand caressed her cheek. It felt the same as it always had, strong and callused, scented lightly with metal and salt. Shepard's thumb caressed her jaw and Ashley tilted her face upwards, surprised as Shepard's lips pressed against hers with no preamble.

Ashley had expected tenderness, gentleness, a kiss farewell, as Shepard had said. Instead, Raegan kissed her with passion; her lips were liquid fire, the hottest alcohol burning down Ashley's throat and spreading through her veins. Ashley's lips pressed back, deepening the kiss, fighting fire with flames of her own, refusing to back down.

Shepard's lips parted and Ashley took the ground given, running her tongue alongside Shepard's own, battling and dancing with lips and teeth. She had forgotten this, that while flames would burn, sparks entranced, and she felt those sparks now, firing through her nervous system, intoxicating her, drowning her…

"You bitch!" Ashley shoved Raegan away, breathing heavily while Shepard seemed unmoved. "Don't you dare try to seduce me, Shepard. Don't you fucking _dare_!"

"Try?" Shepard smirked. "Look at you. Your face is flushed; you're trembling. Don't have another night of regret, Ashley."

"That won't work this time, Skipper." Ashley stated, though she could not deny Raegan's words were true. She felt alive, energized, not how a soldier who had been dealt a grievous defeat should feel. "You can't manipulate me into…"

"Who's manipulating?" Shepard moved forward again, resting her hands on Ashley's hips, pulling their bodies together until no space, no air, nothing but the hum-wire of electricity arced between them. Raegan leaned forward, pressing her lips to the pulse point of Ashley's neck, feeling it hop skip race against her lips. "I feel it too." Raegan whispered as Ashley's head fell back, against her will…or was it. "I always have. Can't you just let go for a goddamn minute and _feel __**something**_?"

A muted cry escaped Ashley's lips as Shepard's teeth bit down on the sensitive skin between shoulder and neck, sending shockwaves through her, tingling in her fingers, down her spine, across her breasts. She sucked in air as Shepard's hand moved from her hip, up, along her side in a gentle massage. Every part of Ashley began to ache as she felt the surety of Raegan's hands.

Her mind flashed back to Ilos, the heat and pulsating current that had been between them then. The muted electricity that flowed through her now as Shepard's nails raked down her back. Before there had been rank and policy dividing them but now, in this moment, all that stood before her, that assaulted her neck with kisses as those divine murderer's hands caressed her, was just a woman. Raegan Shepard.

_Rae…gan…Shep…ard_, Ashley's thoughts groaned on ragged breaths. Not an officer, not her commander, nothing to her but someone warm and passionate. Someone in whom she could bury the defeat of Horizon. Someone whose hands would be her equal, not her superior.

Ashley grabbed Shepard's collar and wrenched the woman upwards, forcing their lips together as she held Shepard against her. She felt the lips that had been fire turn to iron as they resisted against Ashley's relentless assault. Shepard had always been taller, but her body was wiry where Ashley's was muscular. Using that to her advantage, the chief pushed forward with arms and hips, backing Shepard towards the small cot in the room and forcing her down onto the mattress.

Shepard leered as Ashley stood above her, straddling Raegan's legs with her own. The razor grin flashed once more as Shepard snaked out one of her legs and pulled at the back of Ashley's knee, sending the chief off balance. In an artful move, Shepard rose, threw her arm around Ashley's waist and used the momentum of her fall to reverse their positions. Like a wolf going in for the kill, Shepard placed her teeth against Ashley's throat, nipping along the lines of taut muscle.

Ashley struggled beneath her, thrusting a muscled leg between Raegan's thighs in an attempt to unseat her. Shepard groaned and forced her hips downward, pinning Ashley's leg against the bed. Elegant, terrible hands ripped at the chief's zipper, forcing the recalcitrant metal down, baring an expanse of creamy caramel flesh that begged to be tasted.

Ashley's body throbbed as Shepard's lips moved down her throat and across her chest, between her breasts. Then teeth, shocking and sharp, scraping across the defined muscles of her abdomen. The muscles twitched as the heat between their bodies flared and Ashley wanted to scream, in frustration, in anger, in pure and absolute bliss. Shepard assaulted her relentlessly, her hands tearing at the skin-tight under-armor, smiling as it revealed two perfect breasts, capped with taut, mocha nipples.

Ashley reached up, determined that Raegan would be as bare as she herself was, as vulnerable and viciously desperate. Shepard's hands iced around Ashley's wrists, and the chief shuddered as she remembered what she had seen these hands do. They could rip apart a krogan battlemaster with nothing but a K-Bar. They could string a violin and wring music that would turn the hardest heart to mush from it. Those hands held Ashley's own captive and the mouth that could call down the fury of hell and drive spirits to the grandeur of heaven closed around her left nipple.

Ashley cried out as Shepard's teeth savaged and tongue soothed the sensitive flesh in alternating currents that served to make her muscles leap and fluctuate. Her body pleaded to surrender as her breathing grew heavy and moisture slicked her thighs. She threw her head back and closed her eyes, reveling in the sensation of Shepard's hands as they kneaded and scraped her legs and sides, Shepard's lips as they worshipped and ravaged her breasts.

"I dreamed of this." Shepard growled as she pulsed her hips against Ashley's own, drawing an incoherent noise from the chief. "Every night since Ilos, I wanted to make you mine. While I burned in hell, I wanted to make you mine."

The words burned against Ashley's ears, but not a pleasant flame. They scoured her like acid, the possessive note in Raegan's voice driving her all but insane. The woman above her had slaughtered indiscriminately, not caring who was caught in the crossfire. She had waged a war across the galaxy, hunting Saren, but not out of altruism, not for the greater good. It had been a new high for Raegan Shepard, Butcher of Torfan. She had gloried in the explosions, the destruction, the blood on her hands. In the last moments, Ashley had lost her pride, her integrity, her sense of _right_. She did not want to be possessed by a woman like Shepard.

_I will __**not**__ be made anything by her! _Ashley's thoughts screamed.

Faster than thought, she broke her hand free of Shepard's grasp and punched the woman across the face. Shepard's eyes glazed and Ashley rose, grasping Raegan's shoulders and reversing their positions once more. Shepard's long, dexterous fingers reached up to touch the reddening mark on her cheek, scarcely noticing that Ashley ripped at her clothing, tearing it off of her piece by piece with no gentleness.

Ashley caught her breath as she stared down at the woman she had admired, feared, fought with and alongside. The pale flesh beneath her sent another throb of desire between her legs, aching to be sated, soothed, but not possessed, not chained. Ashley's fingernails raked across Shepard's torso, where a scar had once stretched from beneath her right breast to her navel. The red lines stood out stark against the creamy skin as Ashley continued her assault, marking with teeth and nails every place on Shepard's body where a scar should have been.

Harsh, stilted noises of pained pleasure tore from Raegan's throat as Ashley bit deep at the juncture of torso and thigh, where a bullet had struck Shepard in the fight against Saren.

"You're a fucking monster." Ashley hissed as she ran her fingers through the slick swollen flesh of Raegan's sex. "You're unnatural. You're an obscenity, a blasphemy, and nothing that I ever, _ever_ wanted in my life."

"You hate me so much, then stop." Raegan hissed as Ashley's other hand tormented a pebbled, pink nipple.

"No." Ashley growled, thrusting three fingers deep within Shepard, glorying in the hoarse, pained noise that shredded through the room. "You talk about being in hell; I'll put you through it again." Ashley continued to thrust into Shepard in sharp, fast, primal movements. She attempted not to focus on the heady scent of Raegan's arousal, the velvet strength fluttering against her fingers. "I'll take you to hell and back, Shepard. Hell and back; where I've been and where you _won't_ ever take me again."

Ashley grinned in satisfaction as Shepard's body became wire tight, as her hands clutched the scratchy, uncomfortable, military issue blanket. The chief continued her assault, letting sweat bead on her forehead and sting as it slipped into her eyes. Shepard's walls tightened around her hand and she moved her other hand, circling Raegan's clit with two fingers in gentle, subtle sweeps completely antonymic to the vicious penetration of her fingers.

Shepard's body went taut and began shaking as Ashley forced herself to continue, pushing through the ache in her shoulder and jaw, which she had clenched tight in concentration. Her reward came moments later as Raegan gasped out a solid stream of epithets as her walls contracted and released around Ashley's fingers. A grim smile crossed Ashley's face as she curved her fingers upwards and pulled out with a jerk, her nails raking the most sensitive of inner flesh. Her reward was a throaty growl of pain, barely muted by the knife-slice of residual pleasure.

Somewhat unsteady, Ashley pushed off of the bed, picking up Shepard's clothes from where she had thrown them. She cleaned her hand on Raegan's shirt and threw the clothing at her former commander's naked, shuddering body.

"Get out." Ashley ordered. "Now, Raegan. This is one time you don't get to win."

Shepard's eyes opened, the green icy and predatory. "Nicely played, chief." she tucked a strand of sweaty hair behind her ear. "And a beautiful execution if I do say so myself. Give me a hand up and I'll get dressed and out of your hair, forever if you want it that way."

Shepard extended her hand and Ashley frowned as she noticed its steadiness. In her mind, she knew she could not trust this new incarnation of her once admired, once longed-for commanding officer. But Raegan had flown her true colors all along…it had simply taken this moment for Ashley to see them for what they were. And she had been the victor. Her body ached for release, craved it even, but not at this woman's hands.

She had made the right decision on Ilos. No matter Raegan's words, brutal or beatific, she could never take them at face value. The great Commander Shepard could fool the rest of the galaxy, but not Ashley Williams.

It was not a show of trust, but an act of defiance as Ashley reached out and took Shepard's hand, lifting her into a sitting position.

"That was some hit, chief." Shepard's fingers moved to the rapidly darkening bruise on her cheek. "Distracted me long enough that you got my boots off. Of course," Shepard smirked, "you have great hands."

Ashley scoffed. "I don't know what I am to you, Raegan." she said. "But I argued with myself for a long while. At one point, I thought I was in love with you…and I thought you were with me. But I don't think you've ever loved anything in your entire life."

Shepard bent over the side of the bed and lifted her boots onto it, her movements slow and methodical. She looked into Ashley's dark eyes, her own filled with some new emotion, beautiful and broken.

"That's where you're wrong, Ash." she whispered.

The words, striking in their absolute sincerity, jarred Ashley from her thoughts and their vehemence. She was unaware of any shift until she felt strong, warm hands grasping her hips, pulling her forward and peeling down her under-armor simultaneously. A protest was at the tip of her tongue, her fingers curling into another fist when she felt a gentle kiss pressed against her stomach.

Ashley's body froze as Shepard slid off of the bed and knelt before the chief, kissing through the trimmed thatch of hair between her legs, moving lower, reaching out with her tongue and tasting Ashley's arousal, sliding through swollen, electrified skin.

Ashley moaned as her hips pushed forward of their own initiative, as her clenched hand, instead of striking once more, unclenched and threaded through Shepard's hair, drawing the woman's face closer. Her mind was a chaotic swirl of resolve and adamant resistance, but her body spoke with deeper needs. Ashley's legs trembled as Shepard pressed the tip of her tongue against that most sensitive bundle of nerves. Her knees quivered and Raegan stood, catching Ashley as she stumbled. The commander's strong arms wrapped around the chief's body and guided her back to the bed. Raegan covered Ashley's body with her own and began yet another assault on the gunnery chief's senses.

Where before she had been frenzied, dominating, Raegan now moved with painstaking tenderness, her musician's, butcher's fingers slipping across Ashley's sex, tormenting her with feather-light touches. Ashley moaned as Raegan joined their mouths in a sensual, evocative kiss, running her tongue across the inside of Ashley's lips, gently pulling her lower lip between her teeth as she withdrew from the kiss.

With singleminded devotion, Raegan pressed gentle kisses to both of Ashley's breasts before moving lower. Ashley cried out as Raegan's fingers played counterpoint to Ashley's vicious assault of earlier. Ashley whimpered as Shepard slipped inside, beginning a slow, gentle rhythm as she pressed lips and tongue to Ashley's clit, whispering, tantalizing, making love.

The gunnery chief clutched at the covers, squeezing them until her knuckles turned white. Her body moved to a rhythm older than the military drumbeat, older than the pounding of her heart inside her chest. Her heart raced like a hummingbird's wingbeats, ferocious against the elements surrounding her, the solidarity of Shepard's hands without and within, the gossamer slide of lips and tongue in her most intimate places.

Sighing, Ashley floated away on the wave of Shepard's tender assault, tears filling her eyes even as she could feel the pressure building in her body. She wept for the dream that had begun on Ilos, with a refusal. She had craved _this_ touch, _this_ fulfillment, and _these very hands_ on her body. Somehow the dream was still sweeter than the reality, sweeter than Shepard's mouth on her body, than her hands playing Ashley in the same manner as her violin. Because the woman who touched her now, with painstaking care, was not the true Raegan Shepard. This moment was a lie, a mask her former commander wore because a kind conqueror won hearts, no matter the iron in the fist she clenched.

Ashley sobbed as she came in slow, languorous waves of agonized pleasure. Raegan rested her head on Ashley's stomach, feeling every muscle contract and expand, listening to every breath of air in Ashley's lungs. The chief continued to weep and Shepard withdrew her hand and lifted her head, her hair tangled around her face.

"Thank you." she whispered, pressing a tender kiss to Ashley's brow.

Slow, Shepard dressed, saying nothing. She laced her boots and tucked her pants around her blousing straps. At last, she looked back at Ashley, who lay naked and vulnerable and mourning.

"That's 'hell and back', chief." Shepard whispered. "I win."

Ashley stared at Raegan, feeling sorrow and hatred clash as the Butcher of Torfan quirked her lips in that infamous razor smile and winked.

"What the hell are you, Shepard?" Ashley asked. "A sociopath? A good woman? I can't…can't tell."

Shepard stood. "Two roads diverged into a yellow wood." she walked to the door and grasped the handle, looking back on Ashley one last time, her eyes the color of a menacing tornado sky. "I took the one less traveled by."

* * *

_**Author's Note: **Hello all, and thanks for reading this little one-shot. This was written based off a prompt from my friend, and a fabulous author herself, Drummerchick7. She said she wanted to see Shepard and Ash together, because they're both dominant personalities, and that she'd like to see that play out in the bedroom. Of course, smut is still not my strong suit, so I definitely hope she likes how this turned out. In any case, I hope you enjoyed _

_Bright Blessings, _

_~Raven Sinead_


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